Piracy is Great

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In my humble but correct opinion, piracy is fucking great. Imagine supporting a company by buying their products, only to realize you just spent 50/60/70 dollars on a piece of shit game! Wow! All of that support and games are still complete shit. Worst of all, the game companies now think they deserve MORE money by selling you microtransactions, DLC, paying for online play, and so much more! You are investing hundreds of dollars into gaming companies to get lackluster games, yet these companies still believe they deserve more of your money. If you want to play an older game, don’t worry, you can’t! Think you can buy used? No, it’s gonna cost you a small loan of a million dollars to do that. The impermanence of media as one Funimation employee once said. Think the companies will provide legal ways of buying old games? MAYBE! But it’s going to come at some stupid cost like a monthly subscription with shit emulation and DRM. Maybe even remade with a higher price tag and new “features” and changes to the games you loved! YAY! Did I forget to mention DRM? Because don’t worry, legally buying games often means buying games that run like complete shit because they are using DRM and anti-cheat. Wow! You’ve been spending hundreds of dollars on games that now all run poorly, look like shit, are unfinished, and bleeding you dry! Don’t worry because companies like Sweet Baby inc also made sure the stories are complete ass, the characters are ugly as fuck, and every game is the same open-world mess. The legal way of supporting the game industry is so great!

I fail to see how piracy is the worst option in this modern gaming landscape. We can bring in morals but I also don’t see how morals will change any of this. Spending ridiculous amounts of money on games to not even enjoy them seems fucking tragic. Opening your wallets to pay for more content sounds like a bad idea already. In cases like Pokemon S/V, the DLC was installed in an update, you are just paying for the authorization to use it. They are literally lagging your system by shoving more data into the game, and then demanding you pay to use that data. Games are getting worse and spending money on them isn’t even remotely helping. If anything, buying shit games has encouraged them to get even worse. I really don’t see the value in pretending buying games is the best option. Spending money on a game I will play once, realize is shit, and then have it sit on my shelf isn’t worth the investment.

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jeffyTheHomebrewer
piracy is just the objective best option besides indie titles and even *then* i'd say it's only morally wrong to pirate indie if you CAN buy the game, but if you're like me and have no way of actually spending your own god fucking damn money, it's fine.
 
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Wolfy
The morals of pirating have gone out the window for me ever since I realized that corporations will lobby to get their way with whatever the product their selling is, whether it's equipment, medicine, or media such as video games. The grey area of playing your own backups of media you bought is there, but obviously like with the news recently, companies will still bring you to court to attempt to just bankrupt you and force you to stop development on what is basically just a piece of software that COULD create a virtual machine of whatever you provide it with.

I have bought plenty of games new, used, and on hard sales, and I don't care what the company says, I'm playing it however the hell I want. And if it's a game that has required internet access or can be taken away at a moments notice(Ubisoft), then more often then naught I'm going to get a cracked copy or just not play it at all. We aren't missing much especially when companies play these games saying how and when to play their IPs.

If they want their money, they can provide it in a satisfying and convenient way, and actually put some effort into whatever their port/remaster/remake or just old new IP or deal with the lackluster sales. Skipped MW3-Infinite Warfare and came back to MW2019 and it was amazing. Gave me hope for the next release, and then immediately stopped caring again when I saw Cold War and the next entries.

Our backlog is big and it'll last us a lifetime at this point, so no point in picking up pieces of shit on the side of the road.
 
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Ryccardo
Are vidya art?

If yes, then the answer is obvious - art utilitaristically serves no social value unless it's available to be enjoyed!
If not, it doesn't qualify for copyright, which was invented for (and nowadays that anyone can copy and/or edit something, totally fails at) promoting the culture and arts (yes this is a double standard, taking advantage of technicalities in something that you deem inacceptable, one the GNU and Creative Commons guys also follow)
 
plasturion
I don't think so, I miss the times when you could buy a game on physical media like casette tape for the great c64 in your local store for a 3$, ( like port of spectrum game like Strike Force Cobra with only 2 colors and 2 fps) altought piracy for that platform was absolutely legal at that moment. Time has changed, so yeah piracy became a way to face with unfair entertainment. I sitll would buy a casette tape nowadays even for 2 colors and 2fps, but for another super realistic killing simulator i would not give even 1 cent.
 
KleinesSinchen
No. Piracy is not great and such statements are a disservice to users interested in emulation and homebrew. Piracy is the wrong answer to huge problems like:
The Catboy said:
Did I forget to mention DRM? Because don’t worry, legally buying games often means buying games that run like complete shit because they are using DRM and anti-cheat. Wow! You’ve been spending hundreds of dollars on games that now all run poorly, look like shit, are unfinished, and bleeding you dry!
Click to expand...

The content and entertainment industry is producing garbage in huge amounts. And it works! People lament, people rant they have to criticize virtually everything on the situation. But rarely somebody draws their obvious personal conclusions from the apparent problems and stops buying and consuming shit.
The masses just pay for renting access (streaming, online gaming) and they seem to like it. And if not, the question is why they still do it. Some of them seem like drug addicts: they grumble about bad drugs and continue to use them because they can't help it. If I think the games big companies produce are shit, I don't buy them… and I don't fucking play them either. Why would I even want to pirate things I dislike?

Shortly after I joined GBAtemp I posted a series of blog entries about my rejection of any form of DRM… and got quite some backlash despite not promoting piracy.

Promoting piracy causes more DRM and harms the homebrew community. Sooner or later homebrew developers will draw consequences. If I was an emulator dev, I would have taken down my software right after seeing the first(!) instance of other devs being called cowards for taking their stuff down – and not for the reason of being scared (as I would post my stuff without connection to my real identity and never accept money for it).

Gaining full access to our own computers should be self-evident and it has been like this once upon a time. It should be demanded by law to have full (root) access to anything we paid for. How to approach legislators with sensible arguments that go much further than gaming consoles (“You bought it as a gaming console, not as a general computer, so accept the limitations!”) when homebrew users are advocates for illegal (and arguably unfair) practices themselves.

If it was just about keeping access to paid things of the past – legitimate backups – and not the shitty euphemism for illegal copies, the “backups” in quotes, we would have a strong points defending emulation (failing TVs with analog inputs, aging gaming consoles).

When shouting “Arrrr, matey! ☠️" nobody will take us seriously and just conclude: “Criminals.” and they will be right with this assessment. This is fuel for anybody wanting to lock things (not only gaming consoles) down even more.

How to approach Apple with their walled garden offering no sideloading (still no real sideloading even in EU despite the rambling news)? How to attack Apple’s DRM on hardware components being married to each other (and preventing independent repair) when many advocates of free access promote criminal activity? Those things will be lumped together no matter if it makes sense.
=======

There is a way to get rid of DRM on games. There is a way to get rid of unfinished, buggy products. There is a way to get rid of Nintendo’s behavior. Not buying such stuff while not obtaining it illegally.

Problem is what I mentioned above. The way big companies sell (or just allow to rent) their products works for them. People voted with their wallet in a bad direction. Ask anybody to change their vote in the future and provide sensible arguments.
 
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Wolfy
KleinesSinchen said:
When shouting “Arrrr, matey! ☠️" nobody will take us seriously and just conclude: “Criminals.” and they will be right with this assessment. This is fuel for anybody wanting to lock things (not only gaming consoles) down even more.
Click to expand...

The Nintendo Switch has sold almost 140 million units at the time of 2023 ending; the probable less than 1% of the ecosystem is taking part in modding their Switch, backing up games, or engaging in less than fully legal practices to try and fully enjoy the content they bought. I would assume the large majority of people aren't raving online about getting past N's barriers or whatever, as always it's only those with the loudest "voices".

I wouldn't say piracy is the right direction to combat companies having shit policies and shit innovation either, but I would say such a small percentage of the player base isn't hurting chances since the overall majority still buys into the shit.
 
AkiraKurusu
Not to mention non-American currencies, where your US$70-80 jumps up to AU$100 or higher.

Fuck dat shit - I'm waiting for sales at minimum, if not straight-up sailing the seven seas (particularly for Nintendo games - DeSmuME, mGBA, SNES9x, Citra, Ryujinx, Dolphin, Cemu. Or CFW'd 3DS and Switch).

The only two exceptions to this "wait for sales" have been Persona 5 Royal and Persona 3 Reload, because I trust Persona games to be worth splurging out immediately. Still not pre-ordering digital games though; that's stupid, as it's not like Steam can "run out" of copies.
Other than Persona...yeah, no, discounts all the way.
 
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The Catboy
KleinesSinchen said:
No. Piracy is not great and such statements are a disservice to users interested in emulation and homebrew. Piracy is the wrong answer to huge problems like:


The content and entertainment industry is producing garbage in huge amounts. And it works! People lament, people rant they have to criticize virtually everything on the situation. But rarely somebody draws their obvious personal conclusions from the apparent problems and stops buying and consuming shit.
The masses just pay for renting access (streaming, online gaming) and they seem to like it. And if not, the question is why they still do it. Some of them seem like drug addicts: they grumble about bad drugs and continue to use them because they can't help it. If I think the games big companies produce are shit, I don't buy them… and I don't fucking play them either. Why would I even want to pirate things I dislike?

Shortly after I joined GBAtemp I posted a series of blog entries about my rejection of any form of DRM… and got quite some backlash despite not promoting piracy.

Promoting piracy causes more DRM and harms the homebrew community. Sooner or later homebrew developers will draw consequences. If I was an emulator dev, I would have taken down my software right after seeing the first(!) instance of other devs being called cowards for taking their stuff down – and not for the reason of being scared (as I would post my stuff without connection to my real identity and never accept money for it).

Gaining full access to our own computers should be self-evident and it has been like this once upon a time. It should be demanded by law to have full (root) access to anything we paid for. How to approach legislators with sensible arguments that go much further than gaming consoles (“You bought it as a gaming console, not as a general computer, so accept the limitations!”) when homebrew users are advocates for illegal (and arguably unfair) practices themselves.

If it was just about keeping access to paid things of the past – legitimate backups – and not the shitty euphemism for illegal copies, the “backups” in quotes, we would have a strong points defending emulation (failing TVs with analog inputs, aging gaming consoles).

When shouting “Arrrr, matey! ☠️" nobody will take us seriously and just conclude: “Criminals.” and they will be right with this assessment. This is fuel for anybody wanting to lock things (not only gaming consoles) down even more.

How to approach Apple with their walled garden offering no sideloading (still no real sideloading even in EU despite the rambling news)? How to attack Apple’s DRM on hardware components being married to each other (and preventing independent repair) when many advocates of free access promote criminal activity? Those things will be lumped together no matter if it makes sense.
=======

There is a way to get rid of DRM on games. There is a way to get rid of unfinished, buggy products. There is a way to get rid of Nintendo’s behavior. Not buying such stuff while not obtaining it illegally.

Problem is what I mentioned above. The way big companies sell (or just allow to rent) their products works for them. People voted with their wallet in a bad direction. Ask anybody to change their vote in the future and provide sensible arguments.
Click to expand...
Not really making much of a compelling case against piracy. Modern gaming has become an expensive mess where you only buy the base game and then are expected to shill out more money to get a complete experience. Old games have become extremely expensive on the used market and most companies don’t provide a legal means of playing them. Streaming isn’t the best experience because one day you will just wake up and see the game you were playing is just gone. Most current games are overpriced and unfinished. These aren’t issues piracy created, these are issues piracy came out of. Spending well over 70$ on a PC game just for it to run like shit is what piracy came out of. Spending 50-70$ on games just to be expected to spend more to get a complete experience is where piracy came from. Having updates with entire DLC locked behind an activation key hurt the industry more. Quite honestly, piracy didn’t make these problems, executives and CEOs did. For piracy to stop, the industry is what needs to change
 
gnmmarechal
The way I see it - ever since I was a child I've pirated games, and I don't think I've caused these companies any harm, given that for most of my childhood I couldn't buy games to begin with, so I wouldn't have played them at all otherwise. In this day and age, it's next to impossible to get any game demos and frankly, seems like piracy's the only way to try something properly before deciding if it's worth spending my money.

I do find it more distasteful to pirate small indie titles, of course, but I feel absolutely no remorse for the majority of big companies who just deliver lower and lower quality games while expecting more and more money - not that the majority of these titles is worth pirating to begin with, you'd have to pay me to play a lot of them these days.

And as per the words of Lord Gaben "We think there is a fundamental misconception about piracy. Piracy is almost always a service problem and not a pricing problem"
 
BlueFox gui
pirate AAA games, support indie games, this will heal the industry
play penny's big breakaway tm not sponsored
 

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